Ludwig Boltzmann Forum on Women’s development and leadership: objectives

There are two immediate objectives for the Ludwig Boltzmann Forum on Women’s Development and Leadership:

empower women leaders with global leverage

lets change mind sets

I am building the Ludwig Boltzmann Forum as global leadership platform honoring my great-grandfather, and the Ludwig Boltzmann Forum on Women’s Development and Leadership is part if this initiative:

drive innovation based on science and technology

“there is no other forum for open discussions among leaders in Japan other than the Ludwig Boltzmann Forum” (said one of Japan’s top technology leaders, former Board Director of Japan’s largest Telecommunications Operator, former President of a large University, and former President of one of Japan’s most important technology organizations)

and as an additional bonus we will create new cooperations and new initiatives.

Ludwig Boltzmann Forum on Women’s development and leadership – my actions so far

Several confidential preparations with Japanese Ministry officials and foreign Embassies in Japan.

One key conclusion from preparations: top priority and most difficult is to change mindsets in Japan regarding empowering women and gender issues

Next step is today’s (16 May 2016) “Ludwig Boltzmann Forum on Women’s development and leadership”.

How to change mindsets? Expand the solution space and add new dimensions!

The basic issues, empowering women and men to combine child care and professional development, work towards greater equality and improving decision making by implementing diversity of decision makers are similar all over the world, especially in Europe and Japan.

Learning solutions from each other, expands the dimensionality of the solution space.

When we are looking for solutions to solve difficult problems, our search for solutions is limited by our experience, knowledge and imagination. Our search for solutions is in space of limited dimensionality. In many cases solutions exist outside the space we are considering.

Therefore to reach better solutions, its necessary to expand this solution space. Looking how other countries solve similar problems is one straight forward way to expand the dimensionality of the solution space, and that is where the Ludwig Boltzmann Forum aims to contribute.

As an example, many people in Japan do not know that most European countries have a Family Ministry (家族省), which represents Families at the Cabinet level. In fact, most Japanese people I have been discussing this issue with are perplexed by the possibility of a Family Ministry (家族省), and usually in response ask, what the tasks of a Family Ministry would be.

If your country does not have a Family Ministry, if you have never heard about a Family Ministry, its difficult to come up with the proposal to create a Family Ministry, and its difficult to imagine what a Family Ministry should do.

At the same time, in today’s internet age, its in theory only a click away to have a look at a Family Ministry: here is the webpage of Austria’s Family Ministry: Das Österreichische “Bundesministerium für Familien und Jugend” (The Austrian Federal Ministry for families and youth, オーストリア連邦家族・青年省)

And here is the current Austrian Minister for Family and Youth, Dr. Sophie Karmasin. 49 years old, with two children, Dr Sophie Karmasin has achieved a Doctorate in Psychology on “consumer behavior in the health market”, from 1993 to 2013, for 13 years she has pursued a very successful career in industry, most recently as Managing Director/CEO of a major market research company, before becoming party independent Minister of Family and Youth. She is not affiliated with any political party, but independent politician since 2013.

Expanding the solution space: wouldn’t it be better to have at least one woman on a committee promoting women’s empowerment?

Why did today’s Ludwig Boltzmann Forum on Women’s development and leadership happen? Because of Trinity College Cambridge

At a recent event of Trinity College Cambridge in Hong Kong, I met with Dame Carol Black, and our meeting led to today’s Forum.

Trinity College was founded By King Henry VIII in 1546 by combining the two older colleges King’s Hall and Michael House and seven Hostels. Sir Isaac Newton worked at Trinity College and about 32 Nobel Prize winners are or were members of Trinity College. Trinity College is part of the University of Cambridge

Ludwig Boltzmann and women’s development and leadership

1872 Ludwig Boltzmann met Henriette von Aigentler (my great-grandmother), who was refused permission to unofficially audit lectures at Graz University, where Ludwig Boltzmann later became University President. Ludwig Boltzmann advised her to appeal, in 1874 Henriette passed the exam as high-school teacher, and on 17 July 1876, Ludwig Boltzmann and Henriette von Aigentler married.

One of Ludwig Boltzmann’s students is Lise Meitner (November 1878 – 27 October 1968). She was only the second woman to be awarded a PhD in Physics from the University of Vienna. Later she was part of the team that discovered nuclear fission, Otto Hahn was awarded the Nobel Prize for this work. Element No. 109, Meitnerium, is named after Lise Meitner.

Ludwig Boltzmann Forum on Women’s development and leadership – outlook and next steps

Lets build the Ludwig Boltzmann Forum on women’s development and leadership together

Lets empower women leaders

Lets change mind sets

Lets build the Ludwig Boltzmann Forum into a global leadership platform based on science and logic

lets expand the solution space for important problems, and work towards implementing these solutions

Ludwig Boltzmann Forum on Women’s development and leadershipLudwig Boltzmann Forum on Women’s development and leadershipLudwig Boltzmann Forum on Women’s development and leadershipLudwig Boltzmann Forum on Women’s development and leadership